When worldbuilding, one of the difficult tasks writers encounter is understanding the cultures they are creating. As it is, we often do not learn about the other cultures around us or even study our own cultures. One tool that helped me gain a better grasp on cultures as I was younger was the Cultural Worksheet.

Something similar to the culture worksheet was given to my 8th grade social studies class by our teacher, Ms. Derwinski, to help us understand cultures. I wish I knew her full name and where she got the original so I could properly thank and cite her contribution. I have since used it to help organize several of my fictional cultures. It has gone through a few minor tweaks over the years to improve usability.

This Ultimate Culture Creation Worksheet can be used as a checklist or guide. Fill in the document with the relevant information. The first few times you should go in order to help with organization, but feel free to go back and fix things if you change your mind later. This worksheet provides a framework to ensure you address all the major elements of a culture.

Before using this worksheet to flesh out your fictional culture try filling it out with your own real life culture or a fictional culture you already enjoy. Doing so will help you understand each of the elements better and smooth the process of designing your own.

First, title your culture.

I. Background of Culture

A. Time: When does your culture take place? This can be in Earth time or your world’s time.

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Several of the questions from this list were pulled from The School of Arts and Enterprise, re-posted here with edits. The majority of the questions come from my own experience and brainstorming. The hope is to make this a comprehensive and solidly available resource for those writing personal narratives.

How Can I Choose a Personal Narrative Topic?:
Questions to Help You Discover Your Story

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The February commerce-oliday (Valentine’s Day) is upon us, and I’ve got a creative nonfiction exercise for you. This is a wonderfully healthy (though challenging) exercise, especially given how often modern people face messages that tell them they are not good enough, that they need something or someone else to make them worthy of love.

Here’s your opportunity for a corrective: Write yourself a love letter, and mean every line.

Write Yourself a Love Letter

Bare-bones description: In this exercise, you will write a love letter addressed to yourself.

What this exercise accomplishes: The goal of this exercise is to help writers view the strength of their own character without apology.

Exercise Details:

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I started TA work on Tuesday for an Honors Intro to Creative Writing course with Dr Laura Hamblin. In the two class periods that have taken place so far, I already have about five items I want to port over as blog entries. We’ll start with this exercise, where you will write a letter to your muse.

A Letter to Your Muse

Bare-bones description: In this exercise, you will write a letter where you ask for your muse’s help and make commitments on what you will do to earn your muse’s favor.

What this exercise accomplishes: The goal of this exercise is to help writers identify what makes them feel creatively in-tune, approach their creative resources proactively, and to accomplish these goals in a creative framework.

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Characters easily make or break a story. It’s not about having a “good” or “bad” character; rather, it’s a difference of dimensions. To give your characters that third dimension of presence requires adding layers to who they are—patching sinews of flesh onto their waiting bones.

Okay, that’s a bit morbid. The point is that it’s crucial that you take time to develop your characters. This questionnaire will help you start thinking about your character in a deeper, fleshier way.

It’s 50 questions long (with bonus and sub-questions to boot), so I won’t be saying anything extra after the last question’s been asked. Hop past the break to start the survey.